We set up the MSF Access Campaign in 1999 to push for access to, and the development of, life-saving and life-prolonging medicines, diagnostic tests and vaccines for people in our programmes and beyond.

Based in Brussels, MSF Analysis intends to stimulate reflection and debate on humanitarian topics organised around the themes of migration, refugees, aid access, health policy and the environment in which aid operates.

Our medical guidelines are based on scientific data collected from MSF’s experiences, the World Health Organization (WHO), other renowned international medical institutions, and medical and scientific journals.

Providing epidemiological expertise to underpin our operations, conducting research and training to support our goal of providing medical aid in areas where people are affected by conflict, epidemics, disasters, or excluded from health care.

Evaluation Units have been established in Vienna, Stockholm, and Paris, assessing the potential and limitations of medical humanitarian action, thereby enhancing the effectiveness of our medical humanitarian work.

The MSF Paediatric Days is an event for paediatric field staff, policy makers and academia to exchange ideas, align efforts, inspire and share frontline research to advance urgent paediatric issues of direct concern for the humanitarian field.

A collaborative, patients’ needs-driven, non-profit drug research and development organisation that is developing new treatments for neglected diseases, founded in 2003 by seven organisations from around the world.

Then and Now is the unfolding story of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in Lebanon, first presented as a multimedia exhibition in Beirut on 10-13 December 2018 to commemorate the 42-year relationship between MSF and Lebanon

1975: Lebanese civil war erupts

A multifaceted and devastating conflict. By its end 15 years later, in 1990, over 100,000 will be dead, 17,000 missing, life expectancy will be halved, and almost 50 per cent of the population will suffer from war-induced mental health issues and trauma.

Shelling of a neighborhood in Lebanon, 1 October 1978.
Zouhair Saadeh/MSFShare

1976: MSF starts providing medical aid in Lebanon

For the first time since its founding, MSF decides to provide essential medical assistance in a war zone. An immensely risky operation to alleviate the needs of Lebanese and Palestinian communities, it will shape MSF’s activities in conflict zones for decades to come.

War surgery, the team after a surgical operation in Lebanon, 1979-1980.MSFShare

Surgery - 56 doctors and nurses alternated in a hospital in Beirut to treat civilians under attack, 1981.
MSFShare

1982: Israel launches an invasion deep into Lebanon

The Israeli military reaches as far as Beirut, laying siege and indiscriminate fire on the capital and its people. Nearly 20,000 civilians are estimated to have been killed. The Israeli army will occupy Lebanon, particularly its southern region, for over two decades.

Patients recovering in a makeshift health center in an underground tunnel in Beirut, 1982.
Arnaud WildenbergShare

Logistical supply of hospital equipment via the sea due to an Israeli blockade, 1982.
MSFShare

1990-2000: The Lebanese civil war officially ends

Despite the signing of the Taif Agreement in 1989, and after the guns fall silent, communities in Lebanon still face major medical needs, in additional to assistance for the traumatic experience of the Israeli occupation of southern Lebanon.

MSF teams respond to the psychosocial effects of living in such intense circumstances, launching several mental health projects especially in the south.

Facing a substantial armed resistance, the Israeli army withdrawals from most of Lebanon in the spring of 2000.

MSF shocked by new attack on elementary school in South Lebanon

2006: The 34-day Israeli war on Lebanon

From 2000, as the Israelis withdraw from Lebanon, MSF winds down its operations in the country, focusing on mental healthcare in Palestinian refugee camps and in southern Lebanon.

But when another Israeli war on Lebanon erupts in 2006, MSF responds to the emergency by increasing medical and logistical support to the country.

In order to do this, MSF teams, working in collaboration with Greenpeace, ‘break the blockade’ on Lebanon, move supplies to the southern affected areas, and provide ongoing medical assistance to the affected population.

More than 300 tonnes of supplies are sent by sea from Cyprus to Beirut, including relief items, medical supplies, and logistical materials.

The 34-day conflict results in more than 1,100 dead, most of them civilians, over 1 million displaced and major damage to civilian infrastructure due to air strikes.

Lebanon

People in South Lebanon living in total uncertainty

Press Release23 May 2000

The Greenpeace flagship, Rainbow Warrior, which supported the delivery of MSF emergency supplies to Beirut, 8 August 2006.
P. ReynaersShare

On the way to the Tebnine hospital near Tyre/Sour, MSF teams have to cross craters caused by Israeli airstrikes, 8 August 2006.
Sergio Cecchini/MSFShare

MSF teams working with the local community to transport essential medical and fuel supplies across the Litani River, 8 August 2006.
Zohra Bensemra/REUTERSShare

An MSF mobile clinic at a school in Tyre/Sour, which was used as a shelter for refugees from southern Lebanon, 8 August 2006.
Kadir Van Lohuizen/NoorShare

2008: MSF establishes long-term mental healthcare services

MSF decides on an initial plan to run three-year projects throughout different parts of the country, with a focus on mental healthcare.

MSF staff conduct a public awareness-raising campaign about mental health issues in the Palestinian refugee camp of Burj el-Brajneh in Beirut on the occasion of World Mental Health Day, 10 October 2009.
Lara ArapguirlianShare

MSF staff meet residents of Burj el-Barajneh in the community to assess mental health issues related to past traumas of conflict and the difficult living conditions, 3 December 2010.
Dina DebbasShare

2011: The Syrian war and its impact on Lebanon

With the outbreak of uprisings across the region, emergencies and needs intensified.

Lebanon is impacted by the Syrian war. More than a million Syrian refugees desperately escaping the violence and difficulties cross the border into Lebanon. The Lebanese medical and health infrastructure faces incredible strain.

MSF decides to rapidly expand the scale and scope of its operations to support the needs of vulnerable communities within the refugee and hosting population.

MSF projects and mobile clinics expand from Beirut to include the north (Wadi Khaled), south (Saida), and east (Bekaa) of Lebanon.

Out teams offer quality and free medical services including paediatrics, comprehensive sexual and reproductive healthcare, treatment for chronic diseases and mental health support. Activities that continue to this day.

Syrian refugees at a tent settlement in the village of Arsal, Lebanon, 6 November 2013.
Moises Saman/MagnumShare

Syrian families living in former prison now occupied on the outskirts of Majdal Anjar, in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, 7 November 2013.
Moises Saman/MagnumShare

Syrian children in an improvised swing inside an unfurnished building on the outskirts of the village of Majdal Anjar in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, 7 November 2013.
Moises Saman/MagnumShare

A Syrian refugee with his daughter in the rain-soaked makeshift refugee camp outside the city of Baalbek in the Bekaa valley, 18 January 2013.
Michael Goldfarb/MSFShare

MSF is currently present across 13 different locations in Lebanon, running primary healthcare programmes with a focus on non-communicable diseases care, sexual reproductive health and mental healthcare, in addition to three mother and child care centres. At secondary and tertiary healthcare levels, MSF provides paediatrics services and non-emergency surgeries, responding to the needs of the most vulnerable populations in Lebanon.

The NCD nurse is checking on Abdellatif, 56, at MSF’s primary healthcare clinic (PHC) in Arsal. August 2018
Jinane Saad/MSFShare

Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are the biggest killer in countries like Lebanon

Chronic diseases begin out of sight, with symptoms taking years to emerge. By the time they appear in full view, they can be life-threatening without treatment.

MSF has managed an NCDs treatment programme in Lebanon since April 2012, to meet the needs of Syrian refugees, vulnerable Lebanese patients, and others who don’t have access to services or cannot afford the high cost of medical consultations, examinations, and treatment.

Today, MSF is supporting 13,700 NCD patients - the largest number of NCDs patients for MSF worldwide.

Across its clinics in Lebanon, MSF provides consultations, laboratory tests and medications for NCDs such as hypertension, diabetes (types I & II), cardiovascular disorders, asthma, and epilepsy.

Alongside this direct medical care, MSF’s health educators provide awareness and counselling sessions inside the clinics and during outreach activities to develop the patients’ understanding of their disease and improve adherence to treatment and encourage lifestyle changes to get better.

Complementing its targeted psychosocial support, MSF organises support groups and its mental health counsellors participate in outreach activities within communities.

Working alongside the community, counsellors can detect and refer those in need of mental health support. The earlier help is sought, the more the impact of mental disorders can be mitigated.

In rural areas of Lebanon, where access to psychotherapy and specialised mental healthcare is virtually non-existent, MSF implements the World Health Organization’s Mental Health Gap Action Programme (MHGAP), an initiative propelled by the Lebanese Ministry of Public Health to address large gaps within psychiatric services for vulnerable populations.

Through MHGAP, general practitioners are trained to provide – under the supervision of an external psychiatrist – medical support for substance abuse, psychotic and neurological disorders in areas where vulnerable individuals and communities have little or no access to quality psychiatric care.

Video

Syrian Refugees in Lebanon: Coping is not an easy task - ENGLISH Version

Surviving as a refugee can be more difficult than the act of fleeing a war.
Many are forced to rapidly adapt to new, often difficult, living conditions.
This can impact people’s health and well-being.MSFShare

Most of these deaths can be prevented.

To ensure healthy pregnancies and safe deliveries, MSF integrated SRH services into its primary healthcare package across its clinics. The SRH services include antenatal care, postnatal care and family planning with a community approach to spread awareness about family planning methods.

MSF also runs a mother and child care programme in three locations: Arsal, Majdal Anjar and Beirut. The programme is based on a midwifery-led model, in which non-complicated deliveries (normal vaginal deliveries) and newborn care are performed at the clinic, while complicated cases are referred to partner hospitals.

In May 2018, the Rafik Hariri University Hospital (RHUH) signed a memorandum of understanding with MSF in Lebanon, in which MSF will run a birth centre at the RHUH campus under a three-year renewable agreement. RHUH and MSF agreed to combine their capacities, with emphasis on the importance and relevance of the midwifery model of care.

Lebanon

"I still remember the first child born at our centre - her name was Ghazal"

0

5,560

In humanitarian settings, children are the most vulnerable, with the highest risk of disease and mortality

60 per cent of all MSF patients worldwide are children

In the Bekaa Valley of eastern Lebanon, there are around 500,000 Syrian refugees, and most of them are women and children.

The Bekaa Valley faces a lack of access for both vulnerable Lebanese and refugee communities to affordable secondary and tertiary healthcare services, and those that do exist are private and very costly.

Since March 2017, MSF provides comprehensive paediatrics care (inpatient and outpatient) to vulnerable populations, in collaboration and partnership with the Lebanese Ministry of Public Health (in Elias Haroui Governmental Hospital) and the medical NGO, Women and Health Alliance International (WAHA).

MSF's activities are an integral part of Elias Hraoui Governmental Hospital, a massive hospital with extensive and immediately available support services. MSF's service has a capacity of 28 beds that provides paediatrics care. At ambulatory level, the objective of the partnership with WAHA is to guarantee a continuum of care for patients suffering from acute and chronic complex conditions.

Through its paediatrics programme in Zahle, MSF provides specialised and free healthcare, including intensive care unit and Thalassemia care services.

Paediatrics

Lebanon: MSF provides specialised paediatric care in Bekaa Valley

msf-me.org30 Apr 2018

Mar 2017

Paediatric project started

Dec 2017

Paediatric intensive care unit opened

Jan 2018

Thalassemia activities started

Mar 2018

Thalassemia daycare unit opened

Jul 2018

Surgical activities ended

March 2017 - September 2018

0

4,351

emergency consultations

0

1,737

inpatient admissions

0

52

thalassemia patients

0

120

surgical procedures

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